Tuesday, February 8, 2011

As the years go by, more and more people are getting obese. In the bar graph above, it shows that each year there is an increasing number of children becoming obese starting from the age of 2.

Factors affecting trend
1. Inactive Lifestyle
Due to the advancement in technology, more and more kids are hooked onto the computer. Hence, they do not get up and exercise or move about as frequently as before. Many of them also watch television programmes for hours and do not get up to walk about or exercise. Another reason is that many start relying on cars instead of walking, fewer physical demands at work or at home because of modern technology and conveniences, and lack of physical education classes in schools for children.

2.Environment

• Lack of neighborhood sidewalks and safe places for recreation. Not having parks, trails, sidewalks, and affordable gyms makes it hard for people to be physically active.
• Work schedules. People often say that they don't have time to be physically active because of long work hours and time spent commuting.
• Lack of access to healthy foods. Some people don't live in neighborhoods that have supermarkets that sell healthy foods, such as fresh fruits and vegetables. For others, healthy food may be too expensive for them
• Food advertising. Often children are the targets of advertising for high-calorie, high-fat snacks and sugary drinks. The goal of these ads is to sway people to buy these high-calorie foods, and often they do.

Identifying Low in fat foods
By looking at the ingredients found in each food package, one can find out if the food product is low in fat. Also, but looking out for the healthier choice labels would also aid in identifying food products that are low in fat.

taken from:
http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/dci/Diseases/obe/obe_causes.html
http://webactivate-dublin19.com/fight-the-fat-generation/